Now that we have entered the fourth quarter of the year, many businesses are beginning to consider how they can transform their current systems in time for the start of the new year.
One-way businesses can look to achieve this is simply through updating their current software’s and systems to their most recent versions. Although it might sound simple, many businesses tend to overlook doing this.
A survey conducted in 2019 found that 70.5% of 917 employees were working with outdated software on a regular basis.
Although it can seem like a daunting process, unfortunately, if your business systems are not up to date, your business and its staff can run into a lot of problems. Issues such as limited business growth, low staff morale, slow operations, and increased costs can all come as a result of dated operating systems.
Alternatively, keeping your systems up to date can have a great impact on your business. Below we will outline the five key reasons why you should be updating your computer systems regularly, and how this can have a positive impact on your business.
1. New Features and Functions
It is the priority of system providers to continuously add value to their products for their customers. A way in which they achieve this is through new functions and features included in regular or bi-regular updates.
Some of these new features include added functions to service employees better, and speed enhancements to improve employee efficiency whilst working. All of this is done ultimately to improve the end-user experience.
Installing regular updates to your current systems will allow your staff access to new processes and features that can support their job roles, which will only benefit the way your staff, and company overall, operate on a daily basis.
2. Increased Staff Productivity
Coinciding with this first point, regular systems updates will be extremely helpful in maintaining staff happiness and improving their productivity.
When your business is operating with outdated software, systems can become slow and often, employees do not have access to relevant features that can support that daily job duties. All of this can ultimately hinder any business progress and impact employee’s quality of work too.
As a result of this, employees can often become neglectful of their work, as well as the company that they are working for, purely due to frustration. From a customer perspective, using out-of-date software can also make your company appear dated, and no longer relevant to existing and potential customers.
Updating your IT systems will ensure that employees gain access to the most relevant new features that can help to optimise the way they currently work, which in turn will help to improve their productivity and efficiency. It will also help to guarantee that your customers are receiving a high-quality experience too.
3. Improved Security
Running outdated and old systems in your business can expose you to numerous potential cyber threats. It is common knowledge that dated software can often develop holes in security, especially where there may be compatibility issues between your system and certain software’s.
These holes is security make it incredibly easy for hackers and other cyber threats to gain access to your company data and cause issues within your business.
Up-to-date systems will come with improved security features which will help in patching up any vulnerable holes you currently have in your system already and make the process of intrusion harder for any potential threats.
At DCS, we also offer additional system protection with Amber Vaults Patch Management.
Supporting both Windows servers and workstations with over 350 third-party applications, this automated patch management and deployment solution ensures that your businesses is using the latest security patches to safeguard your business and its data against potential threats.
If you’d like to learn more about our Patch Management solution, get in touch here.
4. Protection of Others
Not only will your outdated systems expose your own data to cyber-attacks, but potentially your customers and other businesses too. When hackers have inserted themselves into your company’s infrastructure, it can be incredibly easy for them to access your communication channels, such as your emails, and attach viruses to any outgoing mail.
Any recipients of your mail will therefore be similarly exposed to hackers that can also infiltrate their data too.
From a customer’s perspective, this lapse in security can make your company appear lazy and untrustworthy, as customers may feel that security and their wellbeing are not a high priority for you.
Again, having new software will ensure that security breaches such as this are highly unlikely to occur and will prevent any potential problems with your customers from happening in the future.
5. Cost Saving
Many business owners tend to think that updating their IT systems will be extremely costly to their business and will cause a disruption to staff. However, it is when IT systems continue to not be updated that they can actually become more costly over time, and cause prolonged disruption to staff,
As IT systems get older it is normal for users to experience glitches, sporadic shutdowns, and slow running times. As already mentioned, this is most likely due to compatibility issues, and the fact that as new versions of IT systems start distribution, providers spend less time fixing bugs in previous versions.
Although these minor issues may not be problematic in the beginning, if your systems continue to not be updated, they can become a nuisance to staff as unexpected downtime becomes longer, and more work is potentially lost.
Further, when these problems occur, it is likely that you will need to pay urgent fees for someone to come and resolve these issues. Especially if they are reoccurring, these fees can add up to a substantial bill overtime.
When operating with newer systems, these glitches and shutdowns are significantly less likely to happen which in turn can save you a lot of money in the future.
Get in Touch!
If you’d like to get in touch with us to discuss any of our IT services, including IT Support and IT Security, call us on 01937 541411 or contact us here.